1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates in general to a fluid delivery device, and more particularly, to a fluid delivery device that includes an electrochemical pump for controllably delivering small volumes of fluid with high precision and accuracy.
2. Background Art
In many situations it is necessary, or, at least, desirable to deliver small amounts of fluids and/or chemical agents over a relatively long period of time. Such fluids may include, among others, medicaments, lubricants, fragrant fluids, and chemical agents. A very common, traditional apparatus for the gradual administration of fluid into the human body is an intravenous administration set in which gravity induced hydrostatic infusion dispenses a fluid from a familiarly suspended bottle or bag above the patient.
Other methods for the gradual administration of fluids have been devised to eliminate the need for suspending the fluid above the patient and thereby provide the patient with greater mobility. Mechanical pump dispensers use various types of mechanical pumps to expel the fluid from a reservoir. Charged reservoir dispensers store a fluid under pressure in a flexible reservoir and then selectively expel that fluid by the force of internal reservoir pressure, the rate of release often being regulated by a plurality of complex valve systems. Pressurized gas dispensers use a pressurized gas to expel the fluid. Osmotic dispensers rely on a solute that exhibits an osmotic pressure gradient against water to dispense the fluid.
While the above-identified fluid administration device types or techniques have become available, there remains a continuing desire for improvements therein. When small quantities of fluids are to be administered continuously over a period of many hours, it is desirable to have a fluid dispenser that is highly accurate and reliable, is sufficiently small and lightweight to be portable, and is convenient and easy to use. Gas generating devices have been developed that are both portable and accurate for dispensing small volumes. These gas-generating methods include galvanic cells and electrolytic cells.
In galvanic gas generating cells, hydrogen or oxygen gas is formed at the cathode or anode, respectively, as a result of a reaction between a metal or metal oxide and an aqueous electrolyte. A galvanic cell is by definition an electrochemical cell that requires no externally applied voltage to drive the electrochemical reactions. Typically, the anode and cathode of the galvanic cell are connected through a resistor that regulates the current passed through the cell, and, in turn, directly regulates the production of gas which exerts a force on a diaphragm or piston—thereby expelling the drug. Joshi et al. have been disclosed a number of delivery systems based on the use of galvanic hydrogen generating cell. Examples of such devices are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,951,538, 5,707,499, and 5,785,688. In the cells disclosed in these patents, a zinc anode react with an alkaline electrolyte producing zinc oxide and water molecules are reduced on porous carbon electrode producing gaseous hydrogen.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,242,565 and 5,925,030 disclose a galvanic oxygen-generating cell that is constructed much like a zinc/air button cell, where a reducible oxide is reduced at the cathode while hydroxyl ions are formed. Hydroxyl ions oxidize at the anode, releasing oxygen.
In contrast to galvanic cells, an electrolytic cell requires an external DC power source to drive the electrochemical reactions. When voltage is applied to the electrodes, the electrolyte gives off a gas that exerts a force on a diaphragm or piston—thus expelling the drug. Three types of electrolytic gas generating cells have been proposed for use in drug delivery devices. A first type is based on water electrolysis requiring an operating voltage over 1.23 V. A second type, also known as oxygen and hydrogen gas pumps, require lower DC voltage than the water electrolysis systems. Both of these first and second cell types utilize an ion exchange polymer membrane. A third type of gas generating electrolytic cell is based on the use of an electrolytically decomposable chemical compound that produces a reduced metal at the cathode, and generates gaseous oxygen by oxidation of water at the anode.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,891,097 discloses an electrochemically driven drug dispenser based on electrolysis of water. In this dispenser, water is contained in an electrochemical cell in which porous metal electrodes are joined to both sides of a solid polymer cation exchange membrane, and both the two electrodes are made to contact with water so as to use oxygen or hydrogen generated from an anode or cathode respectively, upon current conduction. Thus, hydrogen, oxygen, or a gas mixture of hydrogen and oxygen, generated by electrolysis of water when a DC current is made to flow between the electrodes, is used as a pressurization source of the drug dispenser.
Electrochemical oxygen and hydrogen pumps are constructed in a similar way to the above discussed water electrolysis cell and are described in several United States patents, including U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,938,640, 4,902,278, 4,886,514, and 4,522,698. Electrochemically driven fluid dispensers disclosed in these patents have an electrochemical cell in which porous gas diffusion electrodes are joined respectively to the opposite surfaces of an ion exchange membrane containing water functioning as an electrolyte. The electrochemically driven fluid dispenser uses such a phenomenon that when hydrogen is supplied to an anode of the electrochemical cell and a DC current is made to flow between the anode and the cathode, the hydrogen becomes hydrogen ions at the anode. When the produced hydrogen ions reach the cathode through the ion exchange membrane, an electrochemical reaction arises to generate gaseous hydrogen thereat. Since the net effect of these processes is transport of hydrogen from one side of the membrane to the other, this cell is also called hydrogen pump. The hydrogen generated and pressurized at the cathode is used as a driving source for pushing a piston, a diaphragm, or the like.
Alternatively, oxygen may be used in place of hydrogen as a reactant in this type of electrochemical cell, wherein the cell then act as an oxygen pump. Thus, oxygen is reduced on one side of a water-containing electrolytic cell and water is oxidized on the opposite side to generate molecular oxygen, with the molecular oxygen so generated being used as the propellant to force liquid from an adjacent reservoir. A variety of different types of devices have been developed and patented.
Gas generating electrolytic cells based on use of electrolytically decomposable chemical compound which produces a reduced metal at the cathode, and generates gaseous oxygen by water oxidation at the anode are disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,744,014. The cell generally includes a graphite anode, an aqueous electrolyte, and a copper hydroxide cathode. As electrical current passes through a circuit in which the cell is connected, copper is plated out in the cathode, and oxygen is released at the anode. To ensure storage stability, an active cathode material is selected such that the cells require an applied voltage for the electrochemical reactions to proceed. A battery cell is provided in the circuit to drive the current through the gas-generating cell. The rate of oxygen generated at the anode is directly proportional to the current, and acts as a pressurizing agent to perform the work of expelling a fluid from a bladder or other fluid-containing reservoir which has a movable wall which is acted upon as the gas is generated.
While the above-identified electrochemically driven fluid delivery devices are operable for certain applications, they are not optimal for others. In particular, the above-identified fluid delivery devices are based on gas generation, and are suitable for fluid delivery at rates greater than about 20 microliters per day. However, for delivery of very small drug volumes such as about 100 microliters over an extended period of time, and especially for implantable devices, gas generation is not a suitable method for drug delivery. Another problem is that gas generating pumps are sensitive to temperature and atmospheric pressure. For this purpose, osmotic and electroosmotic pumps are more appropriate.
An osmotic pump involves imbibing water or another driving fluid. The pump consists of three chambers: a salt chamber, a water chamber, and a drug chamber. The salt and water chambers are separated by a semi-permeable membrane. This membrane is permeable to water but impermeable to salt. The drug chamber is separated from the other two by a flexible diaphragm. Water imbibes osmotically into the salt chamber creating hydrostatic pressure, which in turn exerts a force on the diaphragm—thus expelling the fluid. The use of osmotic pumps is typically limited to application requiring constant fluid delivery. In order to vary the fluid flow, it is typically necessary to provide numerous osmotic pumps with differing outputs. These limitations make it inconvenient for the patient to use and control such devices. Osmotic pumps also require charging, (the time required for liquid to diffuse through the semi-permeable membrane and begin dissolving the osmagent at steady state) which delays delivery of the medicament, and further limits their suitability for instantaneous or emergency use.
An electroosmotic pump pumps a fluid susceptible to electroosmotic transport. Electroosmotic pump is an electrolytic cell having a permselective ion exchange membrane and therefore it requires an external DC power source to drive the electrode reactions. U.S. Pat. No. 3,923,426 discloses an electrochemically driven fluid dispenser based on electroosmotic fluid transport. The pump comprises a plastic housing having a fluid inlet and outlet, a pair of spaced silver-silver chloride electrodes disposed in the housing and connected to a D.C. power source, a porous ceramic plug which has a high zeta potential relative to the fluid, a cation exchange membrane positioned on each side of the ceramic plug between it and the electrode facing it and passageway in the housing extended from the fluid inlet to one side of the plug and from the other side of the plug to the outlet. When a potential difference is applied across anode and cathode the transport fluid will flow through porous plug in the direction from anode to cathode. This pump is suitable for fluid delivery at rates greater than about 20 microliters per day. The main disadvantage of such electroosmotic pumps with a porous plug is that the delivery pressures are very low, well below 0.5 ATM. In addition, any ions in the driving fluid will substantially effect the zeta potential and reduce the electro-osmotic flow.
Accordingly, there has been a need for a volume efficient fluid dispenser where the delivery mechanism occupies a part of the overall device, that is portable, can be miniaturized and therefore implanted, and is highly accurate in the delivering small volumes of fluid with precision and accuracy, that can be programmed at will to change the release rate.